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Carly Fiorina Cries Foul at the GOP Debate Cutoff

By Francis X. Clines August 26, 2015 5:12 pmAugust 26, 2015 5:12 pm

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Carly Fiorina.Credit Jim Cole/Associated Press

Will Carly Fiorina manage to get on the big stage next month in the second Republican presidential debate? The question is in part a technical one involving how poll numbers are weighed in rating Mrs. Fiorina before and after the Fox News debate earlier this month, where she stood out as a considerable winner despite being relegated to the also-ran set of candidates. It is also a question of how sensitive Republican leaders are to charges that the party habitually treats women as second-class citizens. Mrs. Fiorina, despite rising significantly in recent polls, argues that the Republican National Committee and CNN, the debate sponsor, are using a mix of old and new polling numbers that could unfairly block her from the prime-time show next month.

“Despite being solidly in the top 10 by every measure, the political establishment is still rigging the game to keep Carly off the main debate stage next month,” Sarah Isgur Flores, Mrs. Fiorina’s deputy campaign manager, charged today, complaining that the CNN polling formula for setting the top ten candidates downplays the candidate’s considerable surge in popularity since her first debate performance. Before the Fox debate, there were nine national polls available to help choose the top ten. Since then, there have been only two national polls and political experts question whether there will be many more before the Sept. 16 debate. If not, Mrs. Fiorina, the former Hewlett-Packard CEO, might miss the cut, even though the two latest national polls show her at a solid five percent, worthy of a spot on stage. She has risen from 2 percent and less in the pre-debate polls.

“There’s loads of state polls, they all say the same thing— that I’m in the top five,” Mrs. Fiorina declared on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe,” emphatically crying foul as the debate approaches.

The R.N.C. defended the CNN standards last month, insisting that party officials have no authority to alter the polling formula; election law stipulates that only media outlets and non-profit organizations may play a host role in the debates. So far, CNN is holding fast. If there is no change in the top-ten formula, Republican leaders should be every bit as worried as Mrs. Fiorina about how the public will view denying the sole woman in the crowded field of men access to the debate showcase, especially since that woman showed enough prowess in the first debate to stand out from the men at the “kiddies’ table.”

Mrs. Fiorina’s rival candidates aren’t saying much about her complaint, there being no gentlemen’s code in political warfare. If the formula were to be changed along lines she considers a fairer reflection of her standing, Mrs. Fiorina would bump one male candidate from the stage. Currently the man considered most likely is Gov. Chris Christie of New Jersey.